Foxconn A78AX-S and abit AX78 - value motherboards on the AMD 770 chipset
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Date: 30.06.2008 |
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BIOS, monitoring, overclocking tools
The BIOS of Foxconn A78AX-S is based on the AMI BIOS version, while the BIOS of the abit board - on the Award BIOS Phoenix version.
We start with the memory settings. Both the boards provide the user with a really wide selection of latency timings:
As regards the setting of memory frequency, both the boards allow setting any available frequency supported by an AMD processor (since the memory controller is integrated into the CPU).
Now look at the system monitoring section.
At this part, the abit board takes a lead, which not only determines the temperature of the CPU and the system, but also the temperature of the power converter. Besides, the abit board keeps track of the rotational speeds of the four fans versus two in the Foxconn board.
Besides, the boards support the feature for dynamic adjustment of the rotational speed of the two coolers depending on the temperatures of the CPU and the system.
Overclocking and stability
Before we move on to overclocking, let's look at the power converters. The PWM of the abit board uses a 4-phase scheme in which there are eight 680 mkF and four 1000 mkF capacitors. The PWM of the Foxconn board uses a 4-phase power scheme, in which there are eight 1800 mkF and four 1000 mkF capacitors.
Note that on the power components of the PWM of the abit board there is a separate radiator which is linked to the radiator of the north bridge with a heat pipe.
Now on to the overclocking features.
| Motherboard |
Foxconn A78AX-S |
abit AX78 |
| Multiplier adjustment |
+
|
+
|
| HyperTransport multiplier adjustment |
+
|
+
|
| HTT adjustable |
within 190 MHz to 400 MHz (1 MHz) |
within 180 MHz to 400 MHz (1 MHz) |
| Vcore adjustment |
within +0 to +0.775V (0.025V); |
within 1.35V to 1.72 V (0.02-0.03V) |
| Vmem adjustment |
within +0 to +0.6V (0.05V); |
within 1.8V to 2.5 V (0.05-0.1V) |
| Vdd adjustment |
within +0 to +0.6V (0.05V); |
within 1.8V to 2.35V (0.05-0.13V) |
| Vdd adjustment (1.1V) |
- |
within 1.1V to 1.9V (0.02-0.1V) |
| Vsb adjustment (1.2V) |
combined with the Vht adjustment |
within 1.2 V to 1.57V (0.03-0.7V) |
| Vht adjustable |
within +0 to +0.36V (0.03V); |
within 1.2 to 1.5V (0.05V) |
| PCI-E adjustment |
within 90 MHz to 250 MHz (1 MHz) |
within 100 MHz to 200 MHz (1 MHz) |
To start with, the Foxconn wouldn't overclock the CPU at all: a raise of the HTT frequency by even 4 MHz immediately resulted in the system hang. As regards the abit board, its result proved lower than the average - the maximum stable HTT frequency = 280 MHz (and up to 266 MHz the system was running with the nominal voltage levels).
However, we should note that the boards used the pre-release version of the BIOS, so we are sure that future firmware updates will improve the situation with overclocking.
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